In electrical systems, flexible printed circuits are employed as electrical jumpers or cables for interconnecting rows of terminal pins or pads of printed circuit boards. A connector, mounted to one or both ends of the jumper, is formed with a set of electrical receptacles or sockets which are designed to receive the terminal posts or contact the pads on the printed circuit board.
In today's world wide electronics market, manufacturers are placing emphasis on increasing their product's reliably and reducing assembly costs to remain competitive. A primary focus of each manufacturer is to reduce the cost and increase the circuit density associated with interconnecting the sub-assemblies and components found within its products. Another emerging focus in today's electronics market is to pack more electronic functions into smaller packages. This means higher density modules, each requiring multiple interconnections to other modules.
Connector manufacturers have not kept pace with today's market needs. Simply stated, conventional connector technology cannot accommodate todays high-density requirements. This is because existing connectors consist of individual stamped contacts assembled into a molded plastic housing. The physical size required to manufacture an acceptable spring contact eliminates this technology in high-density circuits. For the last 25 years electronic systems have been designed around conventional connector technology. Connector manufacturers have effectively led this market, and system designers gladly followed, because these connectors satisfied their needs. This cannot continue as three significant events are combining to change the role of connectors forever. They are:
a) A new generation of chips that will drive PC board manufacturers to produce boards with conductors on 0.5 mm (0.006 inch) centers. These boards must be interconnected to other modules or to the outside world and will require a high-density connector and interconnect cable.
b) A new generation of high resolution Liquid Crystal Displays will require conductors on 0.1 mm (0.004 inch) centers. These displays must be interconnected to PC boards and/or other modules. This will require a high-density connector and interconnect cables.
c) The growing use of high-density surface mount PC boards to accommodate multiple chip arrays also requires high-density connectors and custom interconnect cables for purposes of terminating.
These key events have led to development of the self-aligning high-density connector system of the present invention.